


Walk By My Side

by Anonymous



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, First Time, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, One Night Stand To Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-13
Updated: 2021-03-13
Packaged: 2021-03-17 04:27:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29094225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Genji has always hated the mechanical monstrosity his body has become and a recent change to a sleeker model leaves him only feeling more like a weapon. When he runs into a friendly omnic right before embarking on a mission to protect a group of Shambali monks and tries to soothe his troubles by sleeping with him, he does not expect to find out that he is Mondatta's closest confidant the next day.
Relationships: Genji Shimada/Tekhartha Zenyatta
Comments: 7
Kudos: 19
Collections: Five Figure Fanwork Exchange 2020





	Walk By My Side

**Author's Note:**

  * For [yelp](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yelp/gifts).



> If I read the timeline correctly, at some point while working for Overwatch Genji switched from his Blackwatch body to his Default body, so I thought that was interesting thing to include here.

The sight of Tokyo was still familiar, recalling the taste of stale beer on his tongue and the memory of faint headaches that Genji never got anymore, as his new body was more efficient in dealing with the aftermath of alcohol in his system. Back in the day, people had stared at him here, too, but Genji had happily invited it with his green hair, bright clothes, strutting down the street while talking too loudly at his friends. He did not wish it now and yet he could feel eyes on him wherever he went.

It was not the first time Genji had returned to Tokyo since those days from another life. Through his years in Blackwatch, he had smashed his family’s businesses to pieces all over Japan. Now he was not breathlessly chasing a lead, though he was here on a job. Some well-meaning soul in Overwatch had assigned him to grab a few grunts and protect a group of travelling Shambali monks, a mission that was not projected to cause too much upset. The omnic religion had been gathering many followers lately and just as many opposed this development, but Japan had always been more or less neutral ground when it came to omnic rights and according to the mission brief, the city’s own police was on high alert to filter people who were going to cause trouble, so Overwatch was merely back-up. All in all, he suspected that this was meant to be a breather. He wondered if Angela or Torbjörn had spoken to dispatch. Who knew which of them was more suited to treat him these days?

Genji tugged his hood deeper into his face. He could modulate the screen over his eyes to prevent it from beaming green light, but of course he would still draw attention with his metal hands and plate for a face. People probably figured he was one of the omnics who had come to meet the Shambali, but since he wasn’t a known model, he was interesting to passers-by of human and robotic sort alike.

His Blackwatch body modifications had always been a stopgap and anyone could have told, looking at the exposed tubes and joints, the puzzle of scarred flesh and metal. Genji had not loved it even a little bit, but since he had been given an overhaul when he’d transferred to Overwatch proper a couple of months ago, he almost missed it. At least with that body, he had still looked vaguely human. Now whatever leftover meat he had was encased in a smooth, white alloy, hidden from view.

They had not done it to be cruel. It had simply turned out that it was better for his overall health to get most of what remained of him replaced as well. Flesh did not weld so well to inorganic parts. He still had a human heart, brain, a few stumps of limbs and remains of his torso as well as other piecemeal organs locked somewhere within this machine.

 _I should just go back to the hotel. I might as well start checking on the situation._ His assignment did not begin until tomorrow, but Genji was currently experiencing where his head ended up when he didn’t have something to occupy it, especially now that he didn’t have to devote energy to his own mission of dismantling the Shimada family anymore. He was always either fretting over this shell, or Hanzo. The two went hand-in-hand, after all.

He did feel like getting a stiff drink first, though. One bad habit that remained. It didn’t really affect him these days, either, but at least he could still enjoy the taste.

Since he didn’t like to take off his faceplate in front of people, he’d have to find an izakaya with reasonably dark corners. He turned into a narrow alley, trying to get a bit further away from Hoppy Street, where most places were tourists traps and much too well-lit besides.

The shop he stepped into after some consideration was mostly hidden by straw screens hanging from the awning. Inside, salarymen and their female counterparts crowded around tables together. A muted buzz of conversation filled the air and the heavy smell of fried chicken and alcohol made it thick. He approached the bar and ordered his beer, then slinked off to the furthest wall.

To his surprise, he was not alone there. Sitting without colleagues or friends in the twilight was an omnic watching the crowd. It was a standard model, unremarkable in its crude built of straight iron bars, dressed in simple, dark clothes. Genji took note of the exposed wiring in the back of its neck and the tapered waist that probably did not provide full cover to the internals of the ribcage, meaning a sword could easily slide under.

Distaste at his own musings followed immediately. Years in Blackwatch had made sure his first thought about anyone was to consider how he could take them out if necessary. It was useful, but it didn’t serve to make him feel less like a machine designed for the purpose of hurting people. As if in silent apology, he considered the omnic’s face instead, like one should when looking at a stranger – little as there was to note, as that did not diverge much from the default, either. Only the downwards sloping slots that indicated eyes were somewhat uncommon.

The omnic turned towards him. “Good evening,” it said, or perhaps he, as the omnic made use of a male voice package. He spoke Japanese with the awkward exactness that omnics who had downloaded a language, but not yet made much use of it in conversation often had.

It occurred to Genji he had probably been staring at him for a good twenty seconds now. “Evening,” he murmured, and since he felt he needed some explanation for his actions that didn’t involve telling a stranger that he had considered how to dismember him, he added: “Are you waiting for friends?”

“No, I came alone,” the omnic answered. “I don’t know anyone here yet. I’m not from here.”

He’d probably come for the Shambali, then, but since Genji didn’t feel like talking religion, he didn’t mention that he, in a way, had the same reason for being here.

“Yet?” Genji asked, bemused by the omnic’s blithe, even tone. “You might want a bar instead. It’s difficult to make friends when everyone else comes in as a group.”

“Is that so? You seem knowledgeable about nightlife,” the omnic answered.

“I used to drink a lot, if that is what you mean,” Genji said flatly.

The omnic chuckled. “I am fine just observing. I haven’t been to a city since I awakened.”

“Not any city?” Genji asked.

“Not any city,” the omnic echoed with a nod.

“I’m not sure you picked the right one to start with,” Genji answered as he turned away, unlatching his faceplate briefly to take a sip of his beer.

The omnic waited for Genji to put it back in place and turn to him again before he answered: “What’s wrong with it, in your opinion?”

“It’s not a place for good people.”

The downside to his heritage was that Genji was too well-aware that even with the Shimada clan gone, others would rush in to fill the vacuum. He could make a list who was most likely to follow in their footsteps, in fact, because he knew Tokyo that well. Not only could he peer behind the glittering facade, he couldn’t even force himself to look at the front if he tried.

“I don’t know about that. I think I’ve met quite a few of those already. I have met you, for example, and you seem friendly enough.”

Genji snorted. “You don’t have a proper radar, omnic,” he told him.

“Why? Do you hurt others?”

The question was strange, but posed with such sincerity that Genji thought about it for a moment.

“I used to.”

He still did, but at least they were the right people now, so it felt more like protecting others. He didn’t have a guilty conscience about throwing men like Doomfist in jail and pushing around the Maximiliens of the world, but he knew that his crusade against his clan, much like many things he had done in Blackwatch, hadn’t been fuelled by altruism. He had enjoyed those fights too much.

“I think that’s a great thing to be able to say about yourself – that you have stopped and changed for the better.” The omnic turned in his chair to put his full attention on Genji. “My name is Zenyatta,” he told him.

“Genji,” Genji answered, though he didn’t quite know why. He hadn’t planned to strike up a conversation tonight, but Zenyatta had managed to give him answers that were always just a little to the side of what he’d expected. In fact, considering how gruff he’d been, he’d thought the omnic would stop trying to speak to him entirely, but it didn’t even sound like he’d found it vexing.

“It seems my choice of establishment wasn’t wrong, after all, Genji. I was fortunate enough to find you without a group,” Zenyatta said, with a trace of amusement in his voice.

Genji gave a small huff of a humourless laugh. It was true that he had disproven his own advice.

“I do not enjoy groups.” He glanced at the omnic. “What about you? Do you often talk to strangers?”

“All the time,” Zenyatta answered, somehow putting a smile in his voice where his face could not display it.

“You should be careful. Someone might think you’re trying to flirt if you do it in a place like this.”

The answer was rote, something emerging from a place in Genji’s brain that still clung to his cheek from younger days. He didn’t have the looks to back it up anymore, though, nor a likeable temperament to make up for them.

Zenyatta, however, just seemed to consider the proposition for a moment.

“That would be interesting, too,” he decided, with that same playful tone from before.

Genji turned his beer in his hand. He could have told Zenyatta to go look for someone to hit on, then, but he actually missed flirting a little. He’d liked doing it for the fun of it back in the day. There was another thought lurking in his head, too: If he could talk the omnic into his bed, he wouldn’t say no. He hadn’t ever been good at dealing with his problems. Drinking and going out and fucking had been his answer to everything as a younger man, and he couldn’t get drunk anymore and had nowhere he wanted to go, so there was only one option left. During his Blackwatch years, he had dragged someone to bed here and there. It hadn’t solved any of his issues, but it had made him forget about them for a few moments when he was high on endorphins, and that was the best he could get these days.

“This might be a fascinating evening for you, then,” Genji answered, not even trying to be coy. He’d lost the nerve for that at some point, too. The omnic could decide whether to go for it or not.

It was hard to guess what Zenyatta’s answer would be, not just because of his unmoving face. Omnics still had body language, but this one held himself perfectly still, not stiff, but poised. It actually made him somewhat striking despite his simple body.

“Two is not too big of a group?” Zenyatta guessed.

“The biggest one I tolerate. Most nights,” Genji said, not without a thick trace of innuendo.

Zenyatta laughed quietly. “Two seems like a good size for a group to me tonight,” he answered confidently. “Do you usually find them here, or are you a visitor yourself?”

“I used to live close-by, but that was a long time ago.” He tapped his glass on the table. “It’s strange to be back.”

With a thoughtful noise, Zenyatta nodded his head. “I imagine it can be odd to visit a former home.” He cocked his head. “Ah – don’t feel like you can’t drink because of me. I don’t mind when humans eat and drink while I’m around. I know you sometimes find it awkward,” he mentioned, after a moment, before apparently finding interest in something happening behind the bar.

Genji realised he was giving him an excuse, pretended not to notice that Genji didn’t want to take the faceplate off as long as Zenyatta was looking his way. It should have annoyed him. Genji did not like pity. However, he hadn’t found that in Zenyatta’s voice, either, only a sort of friendly politeness.

He finished his beer in a few gulps and put the faceplate securely in place. Zenyatta had his attention now.

“It’s still strange to sit here when you don’t have anything,” he told Zenyatta. “Do you want to take a walk instead?”

“Yes, gladly. I worry I won’t see enough of the city before I leave.”

Zenyatta followed him out of the door. He was a little taller than Genji, though most omnic default models were. He had never seriously considered sleeping with an omnic before, but Genji immediately liked his slim, long legs and the grace with which he carried a body made of crude metal that should have seemed ungainly. 

“You’re just passing through?” Genji asked.

“Yes. I’m a pilgrim.”

Definitely here for the Shambali, like Genji had guessed.

“I didn’t figure someone on a spiritual journey would be interested in flirting at all.”

“I can see why you wouldn’t, but I have already spent a lot of my life on purely spiritual matters. I have told myself that I should make the best of the time I am here.” Zenyatta clasped his hands behind his back. “Does experiencing as much of the world as possible not count as getting to know it better? The Iris is strong, but for now I am not one with it.”

“That’s the most eloquent reason I have ever heard for picking up someone at an izakaya.”

Zenyatta laughed. It was a free sound that Genji found himself responding to, even if just with a twitch of his lips.

“Maybe I’m just curious what’s going to happen if I simply let it,” Zenyatta admitted. “I’ve been criticised by my betters that it’s one of my flaws.”

“Curiosity? That’s not a flaw,” Genji decided. “Incurious people are usually boring.”

Genji was leading the way and he was angling towards the hotel, though he didn’t plan to take Zenyatta up to his room. It was not the only such establishment there, though, and depending on how curious Zenyatta really was, he’d take him to one of the places that rented out rooms by the hour.

“Yet being less prone to seek excitement leads to less trouble.”

“I cannot argue with that,” Genji said laconically. Had he been more compliant and less adventurous, perhaps his brother wouldn’t have felt the need to butcher him. “I still think curiosity makes for people who are fun to talk to.”

“That is hard to deny. What is the last thing you have been curious about?”

“An omnic pilgrim,” Genji answered smoothly.

“I set myself up for that answer,” Zenyatta mused. “And before that?”

That was a good question, Genji thought. It wasn’t like he had begged to work with Overwatch, he’d just more or less accidentally ended up on the main team because they needed his skills. It wasn’t this body, which he wanted to forget about. Hunting down his family had been more of a manic fixation.

_I used to be interested in so many things. I bore myself now with my self-loathing._

“Not much,” he said truthfully. “It’s lucky that I met you, then, don’t you think? You might keep me from being a dull person for a night.”

“Somehow, I doubt you are ever one, but I’m happy to be deemed entertaining.”

Zenyatta halted as he spoke. Down a street lined with shuttered shops, a red torii marked the entrance to a public park. It laid in the dark, but Tokyo was lit up by so many neon lights these days that the sky above never really went black enough to hide anything. Of course, Zenyatta might have night-viewing equipment, anyway.

“I did not expect such a large park ground in the middle of the city,” Zenyatta said.

“That’s Denboin Garden,” Genji answered. “Somewhere in there is the oldest Buddhist temple in Tokyo.”

Since Zenyatta seemed interested, he led him towards the torii and pointed at the building that rose in the distance, glowing orange in the golden light of the lanterns dangling from it.

“The five story pagoda of sensou-ji,” he said, his father’s words coming back to him as he spoke. “As I said, the temple further in the garden is Buddhist, but this is a Shinto shrine.”

“It makes me hopeful to see how these philosophies have coexisted in this country for so long,” Zenyatta said thoughtfully. “It does give one hope that we will all eventually work in such harmony.”

“Humans and omnics?” Genji guessed.

“Among other things, but also unity for humans and omnics among their own kind, and within ourselves: our troubled memories tempered by our better ones, our more discordant urges with our desire for peace...” He halted himself and turned away from the torii. “I suppose solving the deepest problems of our natures is not why we came together tonight, though,” he added, with some amusement.

Genji found himself tongue-tied by Zenyatta’s words, spoken with such bright optimism. _Unity._ He had lacked that for far too long now.

“It might be a tall order after midnight,” he managed, though it did not sound as playful as he’d hoped.

“Indeed. You do know quite a bit about this place, though,” Zenyatta said, as he followed Genji back down the side street they had swerved into.

“Not as much as I probably should. I’d say I was an eager listener to my family in my younger days, since it might impress you, but I missed most of what I was told,” Genji admitted, “When we lived around here, I was more interested in the promise of the izakayas close-by.”

To his surprise, Zenyatta just chuckled again, not at all offended. “As an omnic, it’s anecdotal to me, but I hear youth is like that,” he said. “It seems elevating. Besides, much as I like them, not all knowledge is found in temples and shrines.”

“You think there’s some at the bottom of a bottle of sake?”

“Reportedly, a lot of people are searching for it there, at the very least.”

This time, it was Genji who had to laugh, a sound that sounded strange to his own ears for how unfamiliar it was at this point.

“I looked very hard, but I never found it in that place. Is there something omnics can do instead of drinking if they want to try?”

“We can scramble our code and execution protocols with programs designed for the purpose, though I’d say they’re closer to stronger drugs.” Zenyatta shrugged. “I did it once, but I confess I don’t see the point. It left me more anxious than anything.”

“Bad trips are not fun,” Genji agreed.

He’d done his share of everything that he’d been offered, but he’d never really gone for anything harder than alcohol in the long run – one of the few good decisions he’d made.

“They also lack the nuance of human stimulants. One can’t have one line of bad code like one glass of beer. That is just a glitch our routines fix in the blink of an eye.”

Genji smiled under the mask. “Right. I do feel like I should have at least bought you a glass of consumable oil, though.”

“That is nice of you. Before you came, I did buy something so I wouldn’t just take up a seat, but I gave it to another omnic customer. I can’t actually open my faceplate, so consumption would be a more intimate process than what I am ready to show in a public restaurant.”

Right, the default model problem. No one had built worker ants with the idea in mind that they should be able to enjoy themselves.

“Maybe I can buy you something at the hotel, then,” Genji said easily, nodding towards one of the first buildings of the nature that rose around a large plaza in the distance.

“You don’t need to do that. I would come either way,” Zenyatta answered in a matching, light tone. “I’m sure there will be other things to do than drink.”

Genji nodded his head, though with the first love hotel already only a minute or two away, he began wondering if Zenyatta was ever going to mention his body. All the human partners he had picked up during his time in Blackwatch had shot that off as their first question and why shouldn’t they? Nothing about him was more obvious.

_He’s an omnic. Maybe I just look enough like one of his own to him that he finds me attractive._

It wasn’t a happy idea, but then again, he was pretty sure the humans who had gone to bed with him had picked him out for the same purpose, that he fulfilled some niche fetish. Pushing Zenyatta on that matter right before he dragged him to bed seemed pathetic somehow. He did not need his validation, it wouldn’t have convinced him of anything. Then why did he want Zenyatta to ask?

_So I know the sight of me won’t make him hesitate. I want him to know what he got into._

Genji hesitated before the door.

“I am human,” he said. _Probably._ “You won’t see many human parts on me, though.”

“I am not built specifically for the purposes we have in mind, but I can participate. However, my design is not as sophisticated as that of other omnics,” Zenyatta answered.

Simple information that met him on his level instead of a judgement. Genji could live with that.

“As long as it works, it’s fine with me,” Genji answered.

“And for me,” Zenyatta gave back, again carrying that smile in his tone.

Genji realised Zenyatta must have taken note of some doubt in Genji’s words, after all. His forward friendliness still made it hard to read concern in his response, and he didn’t leave Genji time to get in his head about it as he gently touched his elbow before stepping through the door into the hotel lobby. Somehow, this was more calming than wordy assurances that he was still handsome, which had always been too hard to swallow.

Since Zenyatta stood somewhat uncertain in the middle of the entrance hall, Genji was the one to walk up to the counter. He’d done this a hundred times and the woman at the reception was professional enough not to give the two of them odd looks, but simply handed him the key card with a blank smile.

“You’re invited,” he told Zenyatta. “We ruled out the drink, after all.”

It was not much of a present, of course, not really. Genji had never known what to do with the money Blackwatch and Overwatch gave him, since his life had been dedicated to his work ever since he had become a member. It was virtually meaningless to him at this point.

“Thank you.”

“Have you ever been to one of these places?” he asked, as he saw Zenyatta take a long look at the screens that showed still images of all the rooms.

“Never, no.”

“Well, I can tell you more about these than most temples...”

Zenyatta gave a light laugh. “You must be quite knowledgeable about related matters, too.”

“One of my few strengths,” Genji answered.

It sounded like a joke, but it was one of the things Genji could still do with his new body, one of the reminders that even with shuriken embedded in his wrists, he was not all weapon.

He led Zenyatta down the corridor and opened the room. It was one of the non-descript ones, a clean, regular hotel bedroom, with a view over the plaza and a few soft-coloured, pleasant paintings of shapes on the walls. Zenyatta seemed drawn to the window and Genji used the moment to pull the door shut. When he stepped up behind him, he grabbed him by the waist. Zenyatta made a noise of surprise.

“You walk on very quiet feet,” he noted, looking over his shoulder.

“I like to keep people on their toes.”

There was a certain pattern these things had followed since his body had been taken apart and pieced back together and Genji was quick to initiate it once more. He pulled Zenyatta away from the window, walking him to the bed, where he turned him and pushed him down on his back, pressing down onto him with the weight of his own body. He didn’t want to take off his faceplate, so he could not kiss him, but at least Zenyatta also didn’t have a mouth. However, he did lean up his head and gently knocked their foreheads together as he put his arms around Genji. The gesture was strangely sweet.

He backed off to pull Zenyatta’s pullover away, see what he had to work with. As he’d expected, Zenyatta had quite a few exposed pistons and cables here, too. He had never slept with an omnic, but he’d watched all the porn he could get his hands on as a younger man and he at least had a vague idea what might work. The exposed parts and wiring tended to be especially sensitive, thanks to electronic nerves implemented there to alert omnics of danger.

“Let me get rid of this, too,” Zenyatta said, shifting away from him to pull down his trousers.

Maybe it made sense that an omnic wouldn’t feel shame, or maybe it was just Zenyatta’s quiet confidence, but Genji felt a bolt of lust as he watched him sit naked on the bed, holding Genji’s gaze. As Zenyatta had warned him, his parts were a little rudimentary – he had a cock that looked smooth like a dildo, though it seemed to have functionality to rise, guessing by the segmentation, and as Zenyatta bent away from him to push his clothes off the bed, Genji also saw that he had an entrance in the back, though since he didn’t need it for the same biological functions as a human, it was probably for these purposes only.

For how basic his built was, Genji found himself shifting impatiently, eager to get his hands on him. He reached out and grasped him by his slim hips, curling his finger around the solid mechanical parts to bring him closer again.

“You look functional to me,” he said in a low voice. 

Zenyatta raised his hand to Genji’s face, pulling it closer. “That much I promised,” he said, amused. “May I have a look at you, too?”

Genji hesitated. In a fight, he usually wore nothing, since his body was even less descript than Zenyatta’s, an actual omnic. All his privates were locked behind a modesty panel. However, the clothes made him feel more human inside this sleek, perfect machine. So far, he had always managed to skip this part by simply holding his lovers down, distracting and fucking them before they could ask too many questions. Zenyatta had escaped him, though.

“I will just reach under your clothes, then,” Zenyatta said easily, when Genji had been silent for too long, “if that is alright?”

“Yes.”

Genji still listened for annoyance or confusion in Zenyatta’s tone, but it was not there.

Tarrying had disturbed his plan, his usual mission of getting through with it all in fifteen minutes, lose himself in the mindless lust. Zenyatta was now running his fingers up under his shirt, touching the ridged area where his ribs had once been, the definition of the synthetic muscles in his back.

He would give this to the body – there were few slabs of unfeeling metal on it, though when he got slapped around by an enemy, he sometimes wish it were otherwise. Zenyatta did not put much pressure on him, but he could feel it going through him as Zenyatta laid back and pulled Genji to lie beside him. His fingertips traced the lines of the disparate parts, then his palms smoothed over them. They caught on the exhausts, explored them, dipped lower to Genji’s hips. His face leaned in the crook of Genji’s neck. Zenyatta could not kiss him, but having his head close, his legs entangled with Genji’s, feeling his weight made this position seem just as intimate.

Genji, watching him breathlessly, was finally woken by his own impatient body. He dropped his hand quickly; the way his cock pressed against his modesty panel was already painful.

A little ashamed for sitting like a deer in the headlights after he’d bragged to Zenyatta about his skills, he shoved his hand into a loose bunch of cables, followed them up to their origin. To his surprise, Zenyatta jumped.

“Is everything alright?”

“Yes. I didn’t expect my sensors to react so strongly to these stimuli.”

“Do you want to readjust them?”

“No, I don’t think so.”

Zenyatta sounded playful again, which made Genji smile.

“Don’t say I did not give you a chance,” he said, as he rolled on top of him.

He pressed his fingers into the gap under Zenyatta’s breastplate, put them where, when he had first seen Zenyatta, he had imagined shoving his blade. Zenyatta made a noise that reverberated pleasantly in his voice box as Genji fingered the sensitive machinery underneath. So close, Genji saw each scratch in Zenyatta’s faceplate, which, unlike his own, did not seem resistant to them in any way. He had marks criss-crossing the metal there and everywhere, the most prominent one running down over his right eye, and another, almost horizontal, above it, its end touching the array of lights on his forehead. Genji followed them with his gaze, wondered where each had come from, attack or accident. 

Zenyatta’s hands were still busy on his torso, distracting him, and one slid down to touch the still-human flesh of Genji’s cock with that slight but insistent pressure his hands had applied everywhere, sending shivers up Genji’s spine. He reached between them and took Zenyatta’s cock in hand, angled his body so their hips pressed together, getting another one of these small, involuntary noises from Zenyatta. It seemed Zenyatta understood what Genji wanted as he took them both in hand. Pleasant warmth emanated from his palm, some local temperature regulation Zenyatta was making the very best use of.

Genji rocked against Zenyatta. One of his arms was trapped under Zenyatta’s head in their tangled embrace, but he slid his free hand down and pressed his fingertips against his entrance. Whoever had put it there had likely done so it could be made use of by an owner, a thought that was so distasteful Genji froze for a moment. However, they had at least not neglected to put a few sensors around the area, for Zenyatta seemed for the first time off his game, hips stuttering, as if he was unsure which tempting source of sensation to lean into. Genji pushed the ugly idea of Zenyatta’s designer away and kept up both the pressure against his hole while rutting against his cock.

His arousal built with a force that he hadn’t felt in years as Zenyatta’s hand now moved with confidence around them and then stopped as he broke first, with a strange crack in his voice box, as if ten sounds had tried to escape him at once, body growing still for just a moment, lights flickering, spine in a curve, reset, re-engage. There was a beauty in that Genji had never considered before, since he found it so hard to think of metal as pretty, and he fucked against Zenyatta’s open palm until he came while he watched him closely, his own hard breathing making the air behind the mask too warm.

After a long moment, he grabbed a tissue from the nightstand and cleaned them up. Zenyatta’s orgasm was dry, but Genji had smeared white seed on his gleaming metal body. Zenyatta sat up and took another tissue to wipe his hand. As he did, his gaze fell on the clock that stood by the side of the box.

“Oh,” he made. “I don’t want to seem like I’m running, but I’m afraid I will have to leave you soon. I didn’t realise it was so late. I think my friends will be worried about me by now.”

“Sure,” Genji said.

Usually, his hook-up removing himself would have been the ideal ending to an evening, but for a moment, he almost wanted to convince Zenyatta to stay back and go for round two. This hadn’t just been the quick, brief relief of build-up and orgasm – he’d enjoyed their conversation, he’d been focused on Zenyatta and not worried about himself ever since Zenyatta had put his hands under his hoodie for the first time, and he’d enjoyed the sex and not just his peak.

However, Zenyatta had more pressing concerns that Genji. And why would someone this friendly and personable not travel with others?

Zenyatta collected his clothes and got dressed while Genji still sat on the bed, watching him through his visor.

“I enjoyed our evening,” Zenyatta said, when he had pulled the pullover down over his trousers. “I do hope I get to talk to you again sometime.”

“I can give you my number.”

Genji wondered if he’d pick up, or if, looking back, the tight ball of confusion and want in his chest would grow to fear and keep him from speaking to Zenyatta again. Either way, they’d likely be on different continents soon enough.

“I would like that.”

Zenyatta handed him a small communicator. Most omnics still carried one; holding it all literally in your brain could apparently be annoying. Genji had to look up his private number on his own phone before he could type it in. He really never used it.

“Hey,” Genji said, as Zenyatta strode towards the door, “text me when you’re back with your friends. You can find your way from here, right?”

“Yes, it’s not a long walk, but I will.”

The message reached Genji just as he left the love hotel. _I’m here. Thank you for your concern. I hope you have a safe journey home as well._

Genji tried to answer for a while before he just shoved his phone into his pocket. Everything he might say would have been too long or too short. No matter – chances were that Zenyatta would have found someone else to talk to by tomorrow, anyway, considering how easy he seemed to find making connections. It was best to put it out of his mind.

-

The Overwatch team flanked the Shambali on their tour through the city, the first leg of which had them meet with a few politicians currently running campaigns on omnic rights or omnic-human pacification, the main reason the Shambali had been invited at all. One sentence from his brief jumped back into Genji’s mind as he saw the Shambali’s leader among the politicians: _Tekhartha Mondatta seems to be a genuinely faithful man, but his people skills are often underestimated._ Genji had figured that Mondatta was just going to let himself be paraded around for the press, swallowed by the force of the powerful people who had asked him to come, but as soon as the six politicians had shaken hands with him, he had commanded their attention and the thrust of the conversation. Perhaps he was not as ambitious as them, that much Genji could not say, but he was definitely as shrewd.

The Shambali were a group of twelve omnics, counting Mondatta, all dressed in long white robes with soft purple embellishments. Those were not all the Shambali living at their main temple in Nepal, not even close, but Genji figured most of them had hidden from the world up in the mountains for a reason and were not so eager to come back down yet, especially to be put under scrutiny by humans and lionised by other omnics. He felt distant empathy for all those who had bowed away from this duty.

While he ambled a little behind, he found himself looking at them more closely. There were mostly default workers models among them, by far the most numerous group of omnics in general, so that made sense. One was double the size and width of the others and had probably lugged around iron bars in factories at some point, another had much more defined features, meaning they had likely been meant for work in the service industry. He committed their faces to memory so that he would be able to pick them out of a group should they get lost or in trouble.

Mondatta was just waving one of them closer to him. Another worker model with a nondescript face, save for – the downwards sloping eyes.

Genji stood suddenly straight, woken from half-attentive boredom, taking a few steps closer to get a better look at the monk. Immediately distracting was a chain of brass balls hovering around the omnic’s shoulders like an oversized mala due to some electromagnetic trick, but on the metal of his face, he recognised the exact same scratches that he’d seen before, a thick one down over the right eye and then the horizontal line above that.

If there was any doubt about it still left, it was gone when the monk happened to glance his way and froze, even the brass balls around his shoulders suddenly holding still in the air.

“Zenyatta?” he heard Mondatta ask.

“Yes. Excuse me, brother. You were saying?”

Reluctantly, Zenyatta turned his gaze away from Genji and Genji reminded himself belatedly to look like he’d just been checking on the Shambali instead of staring down one of them before his colleagues from Overwatch noticed. Nevertheless, it was difficult to deny his heart had flipped in its metal casing.

_Just a pilgrim?_

-

For the rest of the day, Genji watched the monks like a hawk. As it was his appointed task, no one could blame him, and there were always enough curious onlookers and worshippers surrounding the group that there was reason enough to draw close. At least they only had to push back one anti-omnic demonstration, but they mostly kept behind the barriers set up by the police, anyway, and Genji’s mere presence, greatly enhanced by the sword strapped to his back, was enough to sent the cheekier ones scuttling.

During the day, he came to notice that Zenyatta seemed to have an elevated status – not officially, as he didn’t talk to media or the slew of politicians and businesspeople who came to greet Mondatta, but certainly with Mondatta, who most often turned to Zenyatta to talk or point out random things in the city. If nothing else, Zenyatta seemed to be his confidant.

Genji and his men and women ushered the Shambali back to their hotel by the end of the day, which was down the street from the one Zenyatta and Genji had ended up in last night – no wonder it hadn’t taken him long to get back. However, Genji was distracted by a police officer there, and when he counted the omnics going through the doors, there were only eleven left. Zenyatta was not among them.

“Aren’t you missing someone?” Genji asked the ornamented service bot, trying not to make it clear he already knew which one it was.

“Oh, yes, Zenyatta,” she said, pointing at the huge omnic holding a folded set of Shambali robes. “He wanted to go explore the city some more. There was a small shrine in the alleys down south that we passed by. I know he talked to people there this morning. He might have gone back.”

“I see.”

Genji turned away. It seemed the omnic found no fault with this, but he didn’t like the idea that any of the Shambali were out there on their own. At least Zenyatta had been aware enough to strip his robes, but if Genji had been able to recognise Zenyatta, someone else might, too, since there must have been hours of footage of the Shambali on TV and the internet today.

As he walked away from the hotel, he transferred Zenyatta’s number from his private phone to his work communicator. Winston had built them a tracking system that could find just about any machine anywhere in the world if it wasn’t cloaked in some way and Zenyatta’s wasn’t. This was a matter of work, Genji told himself, not a breach of trust. It was just a happy coincidence he had Zenyatta’s number.

The small shrine was only a twenty minute walk from the hotel, but it led him further away from the brightly-lit main streets than he was comfortable with. Too many dark corners for a lone omnic to get pulled into, too many places that he knew were probably caught up in the next up-and-coming yakuza family’s protection racket.

The hokora, a wayside Shinto shrine, was not only small, but also quite run down. A brighter spot on the wooden wall at the back, like a shadow of a statue, proved something had once stood there, but had been moved or stolen. Only a rain-beaten stone effigy of a minor dosojin and a few potted plants stood under the wooden roof now.

Zenyatta was right next to it talking to a bent old woman. Under his wide robes, he had apparently worn old, orange pants with a red belt. They made him look significantly less worthy of robbery than the Shambali robes, but also clearly belonged to a wandering priest. Anyone who had an issue with the Shambali might still take it out on him for fun.

Genji waited in a shadowy corner for him to finish his conversation. He could not hear the two of them, but he also didn’t want to. After his own talk with Zenyatta last night, he was somehow convinced what the woman spoke to him about had to be private. Zenyatta seemed to have a talent to draw that out, but if he was this close to Mondatta, who had spread the religion of the Shambali across the globe in so few years and despite greatest resistance, it was no surprise he had such powers of persuasion.

Zenyatta turned back to the shrine when the woman had left him to push one of the plants further under its roof.

“You shouldn’t split from the group like that.”

Zenyatta’s hand stilled on the pot as he looked over his shoulder.

“You sneaked up on me again,” he said with a note of amusement in his voice.

“As could others,” Genji said, crossing his arms over his chest. “Why did you wander off on your own?”

He was still wearing his regular Overwatch uniform, so it was clear who he belonged with, but of course, Zenyatta had already seen him earlier in the day.

“I don’t get lost so easily,” Zenyatta said. “I found my way back home last night, too, did I not?” He set the plant down. “However, I am finished here for tonight. If I can ease your mind by going back to the hotel, I will gladly follow.”

“Good.”

Genji led the way, making sure to stay by Zenyatta’s side. They walked a slim street, where the sky was darkened by masses of electric cables and small fast food places stood shoulder to shoulder with chain convenience stores.

“Why did you not tell me you were with the Shambali?” Genji burst out, after a long moment.

“Because you never asked.”

“I did, and you said you were a pilgrim.”

“That’s how we see ourselves. Even as we lead others, we have not arrived at the end of our own path,” Zenyatta answered. “It was not deliberate deception, it’s just the answer that I find most true.”

Genji had to admit that was probably not a lie, or perhaps Zenyatta was just good at twisting the truth. Either way, Genji really shouldn’t convince Zenyatta that he needed to tell random strangers that he was a Shambali monk now that Genji was responsible for his safety.

“You and Mondatta seem very close for you to have such lowly station,” he murmured. 

Zenyatta shook his head.

“The way of the pilgrim is not one we look down on. Besides, I am no different from the others that followed him, only in that we have known each other longer. _Zenyatta Mondatta_ – it’s an old music album from the 20th century. Our then-master liked it and so he gave us these names.”

That was a hell of a long acquaintance. It meant Zenyatta had likely been there when Mondatta had first rebuilt the old temple.

“You could have warned me of that, at least,” he said sullenly.

Zenyatta laughed. “Why? Mondatta is not going to be angry with you, since you did nothing I did not want. Shambali are not bound by vows of chastity and even if we were, they would have been mine to keep, not yours.”

“Right, but he seems... stern. Like he wouldn’t approve of one of his guards streaking about the city the evening before an assignment.”

“He can be, but I’d explain what happened to him if the topic came up. Don’t worry about that,” Zenyatta said.

He seemed honestly without concern. Perhaps that was not strange. Back in the day, people always used to think Hanzo was fully unapproachable, but Genji had handled him. You had a different view on someone when you had known them all of your life.

Maybe that was also why he didn’t fully trust Zenyatta’s judgement, even if Zenyatta believed it to be true. Genji had learned the hard way that he’d been wrong to think he knew all of Hanzo’s mind.

“You didn’t tell me that you were an Overwatch lieutenant,” Zenyatta noted.

“You didn’t ask,” Genji echoed at him.

“I can’t deny that!” Zenyatta chuckled. “I do find it a fortunate coincidence, though. I was eager to talk to you again.”

The sentence did not carry a hint of innuendo, which would have made more sense to Genji. Maybe Zenyatta had liked sleeping with Genji, but Genji couldn’t really believe anyone wanted him around for his conversation skills. Even to himself, he seemed too often angry, short, morose.

“Then I have some words for you: Do not drift away by yourself, especially at night. I told you that this city can be dangerous.”

“I hear your warning and I will be careful, but know that I do plan to return to this shrine by myself while I stay here. As it’s a private trip, you are not responsible for protecting me here, either. I have met some friendly people who, I think, would be too intimidated if I came with guards or even the other Shambali, but who might need someone to talk to nevertheless. Besides, I don’t want to extend your workday.” He inclined his head. “I am grateful for your concern, though.”

Genji could not quite hide a tight grin. Gentle words spoken with a gentle voice, but the meaning behind them was clear: Zenyatta had no intention of listening to him. _Stubborn man._

“You know now that I am a fighter by profession. If we were in a temple and I asked you about a ritual, I would defer to your wisdom. Can you see that I have a greater knowledge of where you might run into trouble you have no way of dealing with?”

The hotel was not far now, so Genji felt he needed to be clearer to impress his opinion on Zenyatta.

“I have no doubt that you know more than me about the art of war, but I’m not as defenceless as I look.”

Genji gave a bark of a laugh. “I would put that to the test,” he said. Zenyatta was brittle enough to slay with one strike of his sword.

“You may, if you’d like. I do think the hotel has a gym with a dojo.”

Perhaps Genji should have let it go, but he’d always liked a competition and he did feel like it would be a good deed to show Zenyatta he was not invincible.

“Alright,” he said with a shrug, “we will see how that goes for you.”

“We will,” Zenyatta answered. “Maybe I can convince you I’m at least not going to be stolen by thugs on the street.” He halted as they had reached the steps of the hotel. “Mondatta will preach tomorrow. Are you going to be close enough to hear him?”

“A couple of us will be closer, others will be on the perimeter. Why?”

“I just think that everybody can gain from listening to Mondatta at least once.” Humour entered his voice. “Perhaps you won’t find him so intimidating afterwards.”

“I will think about it,” Genji said hesitantly.

He doubted, in truth, that the Shambali religion was for him. Peace of mind, zen, all these practices seemed for people who started on a much more even keel than him. He hardly knew how to be a normal person, much less an enlightened one.

Thankfully, Zenyatta did not press him. “I will see you at the gym tomorrow. At nine?”

“Yes.”

-

For the sermon, Genji changed the outline of where his soldiers would be stationed three times before he decided that he would start to look completely unreasonable if he continued to give them new orders for no apparent reason. The last layout left him by the stage, though that he’d stopped throwing his plans overboard here was a matter of chance. After all, the Shambali interested him no more than any other religion and why would he want to please Zenyatta? Their conversations were intriguing, but he would likely never see him again after this week.

Zenyatta was right about one thing: listening to Mondatta was an experience. The crowd that stood spread out over the square that had been chosen for the occasion was under his spell after no more than a couple of minutes. He spoke with conviction about the Iris, the harmony he thought humans and omnics would find there, and the beauty he saw in the present world. Pretty words that words some tired part of Genji would have liked to believe in; but somehow, he kept thinking of Zenyatta carefully shuffling plants around in the rain-rotten hokora and that memory touched something much deeper than anything Mondatta said.

He was probably alone in that. All the faces in the crowd that could show expressions were full of rapture.

-

As promised, Genji met Zenyatta by the gym that evening. He was already waiting in one of the empty rooms laid out with mats, sitting cross-legged – in the air. The orbs around his neck moved up and down, producing a melody like small temple bells in the wind.

“You have impressive control over you electromagnetic field,” Genji said.

Zenyatta remained with his head bowed for another moment before he lifted it to look at Genji.

“Thank you. I really like this more than walking, but it does draw attention.” He turned his body towards him. “I saw you by the podium. I’m happy you decided to listen.”

“It was fine,” Genji said with a shrug. “I’m not one for preaching.”

Zenyatta cocked his head. “You and I seem alike in some things.”

“What do you mean?”

“I do think Mondatta makes for a formidable preacher. However, the Mondatta I met was not one. He tutored each of his students himself and spoke to people in a dialogue. Of course, he could never have had such a reach with that approach...” To Genji’s surprise, the sentence petered out. It was the first time that he had heard Zenyatta sound uncertain about anything. “Well, be that as it may, he is an inspiration for many.”

“I can’t say it made him seem less intimidating, though,” Genji answered.

Zenyatta looked up at him with interest. “How do you figure?”

“Someone with such sway can lead people wherever they please and that is not often a good thing. I have seen it too many times before.”

Those were the men and women that Blackwatch had killed in nightly raids – charming CEOs who had climbed up a corporate ladder of corpses, small-time dictators, cult leaders. They were the sort of people who had always been most successful among the yakuza, too. There was no greater gift for those who wished power than a way with people.

Zenyatta remained silent.

“I didn’t mean to say your old friend is a bad man,” Genji felt pressed to add.

“No, I understand. I don’t think Mondatta is dangerous, but I admit, seeing crowds like this, I do worry what would happen to the followers of the Shambali if, for some reason, someone else – someone whose heart I know less to be true – took his place. So many trust perhaps too much in our leader alone to show them the way.” He shook his head. “Still, the worst must not always come to pass.”

“It’s good to be prepared for it,” Genji answered, impressed that Zenyatta would even entertain the idea. Many were too in love with their philosophies, whichever they might be, to open their eyes to the shadows lurking. “Case in point...”

In the corner, he had spotted a container with wooden bō, jō and hanbō, and with a swift grip he took a jō, which was closest in length to his sword.

“I see you’re not wasting any time. Very well, then, let us start,” Zenyatta answered.

Genji turned to get in position. Something heavy crashed into his shoulder, made him stagger forward.

“What-”

“I said ‘let us start’,” Zenyatta answered mischievously. “That means we have begun, yes?”

Just as Genji turned, he saw one of the orbs around Zenyatta’s neck return to him. He stared.

“I thought these were prayer beads.”

“You would be correct. They have several uses, though.”

At least this would be a lot more interesting than Genji had suspected, then. He didn’t have to go easy on someone who knew how to play dirty.

He took his stance and then launched himself forward, but had to change course with a quick step sideways because a ball came directly at this chest. He spun around immediately, went in again. Zenyatta had good aim, he’d give him that, but from how slowly he moved his body when he tried to get himself out of the way, Genji could already see his biggest weakness.

Another orb hit his ankle, made him stumble. Genji had to ungracefully roll over his shoulder to not get hit by the next orb as well. As he got back on his feet, he feigned to the right, and an orb came racing for him. He jumped left – but an orb zipped by his shoulder there as well.

_Not bad. Not good enough._

Genji sidestepped it, then jumped, and jumped again, vaulting himself higher in the air without touching anything, only with the force that his new body allowed him to build up. He could see from the abrupt movement of Zenyatta’s head that he had not expected it, and he was not quick enough to stop Genji, who was suddenly on top of him, grabbing him by the throat with one hand and hauling his other hand up, pressing the tip of his wooden staff into the cables running up Zenyatta’s spine. Zenyatta froze.

“You lose,” Genji said as he stepped back.

“Evidently. You are faster than anyone I have had the privilege to spar with,” Zenyatta said with some awe. “I had a feeling I would lose, but I did not think it would be so quickly.”

“I thought you’d lose faster,” Genji admitted, leaning the staff against his own shoulder.

“While I appreciate the lesson in humility, I do doubt that a fighter as well-trained as you stands around every corner of Tokyo.”

“Maybe,” Genji allowed grudgingly.

“But I do see what you are trying to show me, and it’s clear that without an element of surprise, I am at a disadvantage,” Zenyatta admitted.

Genji nodded his head. “The better your aim gets, the more you could make up for it,” he said thoughtfully. “They can’t press you if they can’t get to you.”

“That is something I need to practice. I think I have gotten a bit complacent.” Zenyatta clapped his hands, creating a metallic sound. “I am glad you agreed to this. Up in the temple, there are few people who want to spar with me. Of course, most do not come there to fight, so I understand. Even I only wish to have a real fight if there is absolutely no other way. I do find the practice meditative in its own way, though.”

“And useful,” Genji said, turning the staff in his hand. He’d really come here to make a point, but Zenyatta had proven to be an actual opponent. Why not make use of it? “Do you have more time? I do not like that you managed to hit me so often. You can do target practice with me.”

“Gladly. Though my goal, of course, will be to hit you as often as I can.”

Genji nodded his head, hesitated, then grabbed on to the zipper of his jacket before he could think better of it. There was no point in encumbering himself. It did not make what was underneath his clothes go away.

“If we’re going to do this right, then I will fight like I do on a mission.”

With a quick tug, Genji pulled off his blue-and-white uniform jacket and the matching pants. He expected Zenyatta to ask why he took his clothes off when he prepared to put his blade in someone, but not when he wanted to do the same with his cock. However, Zenyatta just nodded his head and whatever he thought about this or Genji’s body naked in the unforgiving light of the gym remained hidden behind his impassive faceplate.

“Go,” Genji said, before he could start writhing under his silent gaze.

Thankfully, with a barrage of orbs coming down on him from that moment on, Genji had very little time to think of anything but where to jump to next. Zenyatta seemed happy with the fact that he did not have to go easy on his opponent because he honed in on Genji with precision and speed. His arms moved to direct the orbs where they flew and Genji thought the movements looked like those of a martial artist, hard, measured, and precise. Zenyatta was handsome in this, too, and Genji was happy that Zenyatta’s considerable skill left him no time to think about that, either.

As he jumped and ran, Genji noticed that there was a slight, almost imperceptible lead-time to Zenyatta’s orbs, owing to their weight. It should have made predicting them easier, but Zenyatta, too, seemed to know about this problem and tried to make up for it. As such, their game became one of prediction as much as aim and evasion. Zenyatta had to guess where Genji would go next, and in turn Genji had to predict his thoughts and frustrate them.

Genji had sparred with his Blackwatch and Overwatch teammates both, but where that prepared him for life or death, this was almost playful, like the games he used to engage in as a younger man, proudly showing up his fellow students, as honing his martial skill was just about the only duty he had excelled in. Zenyatta was not so easily overcome as the men and women he’d trained alongside in the past, though. Genji had not managed to evade every orb thrown at him, his synthetic nerves still smarting where he’d been hit, but that only stoked a crackling, joyful fire as his competitiveness awoke.

With a great lounge, he managed to escape one that was coming right for his shoulder, but this put him in a corner and he had to do a backflip to deny Zenyatta the opportunity to pin him there. This left him briefly blind to where Zenyatta was shooting, however, and one orb caught him square in the back of the head, right behind where his ear used to sit.

The pain was manageable – he doubted Zenyatta couldn’t have thrown these orbs harder if he’d tried –, but it rattled him for a moment, and that was long enough that he realised too late the orb had managed to trigger the release of his faceplate. It landed on the mats with an unimpressive, small thud.

“My apologies! I did not expect you to move that way.”

Zenyatta sounded genuinely distressed. Genji wondered if it was because of what he saw under the mask, or because of the look on Genji’s face. His first instinct was to snatch the faceplate up again and slap it on his face, but what would be the point of that? Zenyatta had already seen what he had seen, and being an omnic, the picture would be imprinted on his mind as clearly as any photograph.

He leaned down slowly. “It was not your fault,” he said, gripping the plate.

One wall of the dojo was a mirror. He saw himself there: his pallid skin that was all scar tissue, the red glint behind his brown eyes, the lower lip and jaw that were entirely replaced by smooth black silicone.

“Perhaps I can still help you,” Zenyatta said, his voice steadier now. “I didn’t mean to throw a metal ball directly at your head. That must have hurt. I do know how to soothe pain and knit wounds.”

“Most of me is not human. I doubt your healing works. My nerves go straight into electrical wiring.”

“That makes no difference. My craft works on flesh and machinery alike. It is not what one might call traditional medicine.”

Genji looked at him in confusion. He had known such healing – Mercy and Moira had built nano-technology that worked on humans and omnics both. However, that was advanced stuff from expensive laboratories. How would a monk have come by such powers?

Zenyatta plucked a ball from his floating mala. It began to glow as if a golden light shone from within. He approached Genji and held it to him.

“Here, take this for a moment.”

Carefully, Genji reached out and grabbed the orb with one hand, curling his fingers around it. Energy was brimming within it, flowing slow as honey as it moved through him, carrying a calming warmth. As he laid his second hand over the orb, the energy spread from two points, through his fingers, his arms, his torso, up his neck and down to his legs. He could almost follow the trail it took through his body. On its path, it seemed to be stopped neither by the remnants of flesh nor the metal in and on him. To the force that came from Zenyatta, Genji was whole, and the places where the orbs had hit him stopped thrumming.

“This is not electromagnetism,” Genji said quietly.

“No. In fact, the floating isn’t, either. I don’t have the necessary parts. It’s difficult to explain – and, for many, to believe in. Even I can only say that I think it comes from the Iris, but as all believers, I may never be sure.”

Genji nodded his head. “I understand.”

From the thoughtful noise Zenyatta made, Genji could tell he was surprised by his quick agreement, but he wouldn’t been if he’d ever seen the dragon crawling out of Genji’s skin, wrapping around his arm and sword. Genji may not have been a believer, but he had grown up in the knowledge there were things in the world that science had no explanation for. If omnics were alive, why shouldn’t some be able to channel these powers as well? After all, Genji had not lost his dragon after the change.

That old fear which he’d carried after first being rebuilt, brought Genji suddenly back to reality. Here he stood, clutching Zenyatta’s orb, and what it did to its body was in truth no different from Mercy’s and Moira’s nanites, even if he told himself otherwise. It would be better if he did not lose himself in legends and myth that gave him hopes he wouldn’t know what to do with when he inevitably left here in a few days and Zenyatta was no longer there to talk of the Iris. It would just be another story like the ones his family used to tell, which all hadn’t stopped his life imploding in a haze of pain and blood and betrayal.

Hastily, he handed the orb back to Zenyatta. “I should go,” he said, as he let the faceplate click back into place. “I still need to prepare my team for tomorrow.”

“Of course. Thank you for your time.”

Genji hesitated before he said: “You too.”

After all, it was not Zenyatta’s fault that he’d unwittingly awakened a flurry of unwanted thoughts.

-

He was only here because Zenyatta refused to be reasonable, Genji told himself the next evening when he walked towards the dot of Zenyatta’s phone glowing by the shrine. Yes, Zenyatta could defend himself and most of Tokyo was not that dangerous before midnight, so perhaps there was a touch of paranoia there, too, but who knew better than Genji that danger could come when you least expected it? He’d rather be too careful than collect the metal parts of Zenyatta’s body from the street.

However, he also did not want to chase the people Zenyatta was talking to away, so he kept in the shadows of the surrounding buildings when he had arrived at the shrine. Zenyatta stood by its side, hands loosely clasped behind his back. There were two women this time, one older and one younger, perhaps a mother and daughter, and an elderly man who waited with a lowered head. Zenyatta spoke too softly for Genji to pick up much of what they said, but once more he felt like they were words that held weight to those who listened. Maybe Zenyatta wasn’t wrong that he was needed here in some way. Not everybody who could have benefitted from a conversation with someone of Zenyatta’s mental fortitude felt comfortable in great temples. Genji sure didn’t.

It seemed Zenyatta had noticed him already, for he turned straight to Genji when he was finished and stood alone by the shrine.

“Are you still worried I will get attacked?”

“Better safe than sorry. I have nothing else to do, besides,” Genji said gruffly.

It was not really true, but he had nothing to do that was as interesting as meeting Zenyatta always turned out to be.

“I see. I welcome your company, of course. Or did you want to visit the shrine?”

Against his will, Genji had to laugh. It sounded mocking, though his scorn was not for Zenyatta, but the image of himself in peaceful contemplation. Even before Hanzo had taken him apart, that hadn’t been him.

“Let’s go,” he just said.

Zenyatta regarded him quietly for a moment and Genji wondered if he had offended him, but his voice only sounded a little thoughtful as he answered: “As you wish.”

They turned down the narrow street again, where red and white paper lanterns hung before bars and restaurants under overhanging steeples, neon lights shining overhead.

“Thank you for waiting for me to finish,” Zenyatta said after a while.

Genji shrugged. “People probably wouldn’t bear their soul if I was hovering over your shoulder.”

“They do prefer to talk in private, yes. Though it feels like you think they would object to your presence in particular?”

Genji glanced at Zenyatta sideways, though the visor hid his gaze. “You’ve always pretended you don’t notice the way I look, but it cannot really have escaped you.”

“No,” Zenyatta said. “I wondered about it. I don’t find you frightening, though.”

He believed that for Zenyatta, at least. He was a strangely fearless one.

“You should. It’s a body only made to fight.”

“Is it? I’m not sure I believe that. I have already seen you do so many other things,” Zenyatta said mildly.

“Why didn’t you ask?”

“If you were proud of the way you looked, I think I would have known after our first night. If you are not, then I assume you did not choose it, and I don’t have reason to disturb your peace.”

“You cannot disturb what is not there.”

Genji stared ahead down the alley. This image here was not so different from his last night in his old body, walking half-drunken through the backstreets of Tokyo, anger and sadness curling in his chest as he thought of his dead father. He had still managed to order a cab to Hanamura, but maybe he’d have done better to pass out in the gutter that night. Would it have changed anything? Had Hanzo just acted out of a singular flare of fury, or would the blade have awaited Genji either way?

“My brother made this necessary,” he said into the quiet stretching between them, even though Zenyatta had not asked, and even though he shouldn’t have. Somehow, Zenyatta’s silences never felt pushy, but expectant – he did not stare at you to prompt you to speak, but he always kept his head cautiously raised, listening if you wanted to.

“I am sorry,” Zenyatta said with feeling.

Genji huffed. “Don’t be too sorry. We were both yakuza. I was too useless to do much evil, but I profited off my family’s fortunes. Perhaps I deserved this.”

The words had slipped out of his mouth before he could stop them and Genji cursed himself. He had gotten much too comfortable with Zenyatta, too at ease. He was still Mondatta’s friend. What if he told him that Overwatch had sent an ex-criminal to ensure their safety?

“I had a feeling you had personal experience with the things you warned me of,” Zenyatta said. “Besides, you did say you were once of worse temperament.”

“Hard as that is to believe,” Genji said darkly.

Zenyatta made an amused sound. “But you should not have gone through such hurt,” he answered, more seriously.

“How can you say that? You don’t know what I did. I could be lying to you.”

“I _can_ say that because I believe that no one should hurt like that. Besides, I don’t know the person you were, but I have been around the person you became and he seems to be a valued member of Overwatch and a man with many admirable qualities – if, perhaps, somewhat overly careful.”

A tinge of humour entered his voice that almost made Genji smile. There were out of the backstreets now, on the plaza surrounded by hotels, and he found himself slowing his step a little, not quite ready to reach their destination.

“I got a second lease on life with this. I... tried to use it for good.”

“And yet?”

His hesitant voice had asked for that question, Genji supposed.

“My original purpose has run out. Now I do as I am told, and I think I have done some decent work, but I have too much time to think – which is never good.”

Zenyatta chuckled.

“It can be quite disturbing indeed,” he answered. “Perhaps that is why we try to let our thoughts go during meditation?”

The fact that Zenyatta wasn’t asking him to try it, pushing on Genji more meaningless ways to calm his rioting mind, made Genji relax a little; and somehow, even after such a conversation, he was smiling.

-

“Good evening.”

Genji pushed off the wall as Zenyatta approached him. He hadn’t seen Zenyatta look his way once while he spoke with the people at the shrine and a flicker of embarrassment rose at the idea that Zenyatta had simply been able to intuit that Genji would be hovering in the corner once more. Perhaps it had only been a lucky guess.

Genji nodded at him and they turned in unison towards the narrow street that cut the shortest way across the city back to the hotel. As the familiar view opened in front of him, Genji felt his synthetic muscles relax. This little evening walk of theirs already felt like routine.

“How was your day? I imagine following us was stressful. I had a feeling we got constantly lost in the crowd.”

“That’s an understatement.” While yesterday had been reserved for the media, the omnics had talked to pilgrims today, one on one, or as much as the press of people had allowed it. Their popularity had once again been made quite obvious to Genji here. He’d been glad for the white robes, otherwise he might have lost the Shambali entirely. “By midday, I clambered over rooftops to tell my agents where to go because I couldn’t keep track of all of you otherwise. Mondatta mixing as freely as the rest of you was a surprise.”

Zenyatta chuckled. “You have gone above and beyond the call of duty. I must admit, I am glad to see him still practicing such close conversation. To me, that is at the core of our creed.” Zenyatta shook his head. “But perhaps it also taught me the lesson you are trying to impress upon me when you come here every evening. I admit, I was often looking over my shoulder to find him. He has enemies, after all.”

“Such concern for others, but not yourself.”

“Mondatta is much more recognisable than me,” Zenyatta argued.

“Yes, I’m not sure how anyone would guess that an omnic with floating prayer beads giving advice by the side of a shrine could be affiliated with monks.”

Now Zenyatta had to laugh. “You may have a point,” he admitted.

Genji smiled behind his mask, looking out over the street again. From the open restaurants and izayaka came the smell of ramen broth and fried meat, alcohol. His stomach, mechanical as it was, seized. The advanced technology that made up his parts still needed food to convert to energy.

“Do you mind waiting a moment? I want to buy dinner,” he said, pointing at the bright orange advertisements plastered with photos of meals next to a restaurant’s door. “I haven’t had time to eat today.”

“Of course.”

Zenyatta followed him. There was only a short line and Genji had just decided on the beef bowl when the cook spoke to him, though the confusion in his voice as he looked Genji up and down betrayed he couldn’t quite figure out why an omnic was ordering his food.

“Gyudon,” Genji said, slapping the money on the bar.

The tone made sure no questions followed.

Zenyatta had positioned himself by the window, watching the street. Genji felt himself faintly hoping he had not seen what had transpired.

“You didn’t ask for me to pick you up and I am making you wait on me now,” he said, mood dampened by the interaction. It was presumptuous, was it not?

“That’s fine. I do enjoy your company,” Zenyatta answered lightly.

All the answers that came unbidden into Genji’s head were too much like flirting to say out loud. His cheeks felt heated under the metal and so he was happy that the man behind the counter called out to him, handing him the bag with his beef bowl.

“Tell me of today,” Genji said, as they stepped out of the shop. “I was not close enough to hear what you talked about with the pilgrims. Did any surprise you?”

Thankfully, Zenyatta seemed happy to speak of all the people he had met and Genji enjoyed just listening to him for now, the plastic bag dangling from his fingers. Zenyatta had a view on humans and omnics that soothed the anger and embarrassment that Genji felt so often, and just now had again. Even the ones who had come to meet Zenyatta only to sharply question him did not seem to have bothered him at all, merely made him thoughtful or worried that they were caught up in such resentment. Genji wondered what it was like to live without a simmering fire in one’s chest threatening to burst into flame at all times. If he’d ever known, he’d forgotten it.

“Ah, I see I have talked too much. I wanted to hear you speak, too, not only myself!”

Genji looked up. He had kept his attention on Zenyatta, so he had not realised they were already standing in front of the hotel again. Somehow, the way back from the shrine had seemed too short for the last couple of days.

“You can come up to my room if your friends are not waiting for you.”

He didn’t know where those words came from – some reckless, younger part of himself. In the end, he just did not wish to stop speaking with Zenyatta. _And why should I?_ he found a petulant voice ask in the back of his head, even though he knew why, he knew exactly what sort of problem it could become to convince himself that he had anything to do in Zenyatta’s world. Wasn’t he just another one of the many reticent pilgrims Zenyatta liked to soothe?

Zenyatta lowered his head, gaze going to the bag in Genji’s hand. “Did you not wish to eat?” he asked.

Genji opened his mouth, closed it again. “Yes,” he admitted. Doing it with his back turned to Zenyatta would be stupid. Then again, Zenyatta had seen him without the faceplate. What did it matter? “If it does not bother you.”

“Not at all,” Zenyatta said and Genji thought that he sounded glad.

They got into the elevator together and rode it to the third floor, where Genji’s room was located. He opened it with the key card, not blind to the fact that this felt a lot like their first night, down to the view on the plaza and the beige, featureless hotel furnishings. He quickly dropped the bag on the table that stood against the left-hand wall to sever the feeling of déjà-vu.

It took him a moment to gather his courage to take off his mask in the bright light of the overhead lamp. This time, Zenyatta had no reaction at all. He sat down opposite of him at the table.

“Does your room look the same?” Genji asked, desperately groping for a topic, then halted, remembering the briefing. “No, you share rooms, of course.”

“Yes, indeed. I’m with Mondatta, Ara and Ven-23. Since we don’t sleep, we have no real need of beds, either. Ara usually uses the one we have, though. Her battery is short-lived, so she has to recharge every night.”

“Can’t she get that fixed?” Genji asked.

He forced himself not to drop his gaze, but look at Zenyatta while he chewed.

“She could and eventually, she might. However, she says she finds these faults of her model to be a part of her being and if she lost them, she doesn’t know if she would be quite the same person anymore.”

“Aren’t they just an inconvenience, though?” Genji asked before taking another bite of beef stew and rice.

“Yes, but not a great one. She still loses less time to recharging then humans do to sleep and she is forced to meditate during those hours, which she often has trouble with otherwise.” He gave a light chuckle. “She never could sit still.” He cocked his head. “Have I said something wrong?”

Apparently, surprise had shown on Genji’s face. The mask had made him unlearn to hide his reactions.

“No. I just figured if someone was picked to travel with Mondatta, they’d have to be a star student.”

“Not at all. None of us are perfect in our practice. Perfection is not the goal, anyway.” He made an amused sound. “Is that what you think I am? A star student?”

“Yes,” Genji said without hesitation. He had seen Zenyatta work.

“Let us just say Mondatta would agree with you that I should not be wandering the city alone, especially not to follow strangers into love hotels.”

A smile forced its way onto Genji’s lips. “Did you tell him?”

“That I did go, yes, but not with whom.”

“I hope you didn’t end up regretting it,” Genji murmured.

“Not at all. Did you?”

“No, it was – it was a bit different from what I usually do, but it was good.”

“I have no other incident to compare it to, yet I think the same.”

Genji halted, lowering his chopsticks. “What do you mean? You never had sex before?”

“No,” Zenyatta said easily. “Why?”

“I... don’t know.” Perhaps it made sense that an omnic would not care in the same way a human might. There weren’t hundreds and thousands of years of culture around the concept of virginity instilled in them, and from what he understood, they processed experiences in unique ways as well. “I might have done things differently if you had told me.”

Perhaps he wouldn’t have done it at all. Whatever Zenyatta thought about it, Genji did not consider his cursory, selfish treatment of lovers worthy of anyone’s first experience.

Zenyatta tilted his head in that way he did whenever he was interested.

“I was not unhappy with what you did, though I admit that it did leave me curious as to what else we could have done.”

Genji, who had taken another bite of his food, found himself forgetting to chew for a moment. Zenyatta often had a hint of amusement lurking behind his words, so it was difficult to say if he meant to imply anything. Of course, they had already fucked and their relationship had been cordial enough. He doubted that Zenyatta found him even a little bit as fascinating as Genji thought him, but that didn’t mean that he could not still want to bed him.

Yet, it was another bad idea, Genji knew. On the first night, Zenyatta had just been a confounding stranger, now he was more. Would he be able to just strike him out of his head? And if not, what could come of this but disappointment? Zenyatta seemed to live on an entirely different plane of existence from the chaos Genji dwelled in.

But perhaps the main distinction between them was that Zenyatta seemed wise and Genji was not. That was probably why he opened his mouth, and, recalling their first meeting, said: “You should be careful. Someone might think you’re flirting.”

“I thought I was getting a little better,” Zenyatta said with laughter in his voice. “How would I make myself more clear?”

Genji swirled his chopsticks in the leftover rice as if he was still busy with his food. “Did you have anyone in mind for running more tests?”

“Yes, indeed. This may be a little forward, but I must admit that your presence over the last days has distracted me at times.”

Since Genji hated this body, it was hard to imagine someone being driven to impolite thoughts by the image of him, but he decided not to argue with Zenyatta. He found his own self-pity unattractive enough and he did not want to drive Zenyatta towards noting it more than he had. He _wanted_ Zenyatta to want him, he realised, found it flattering, and not in the impassive way he had wanted other people he had slept with to want the same, where that fact had just been useful insofar that it would move them to his bed.

More reasons to send Zenyatta away, but the wounded, stupid man sitting encased in Genji’s cold metal body was yearning for that connection and so he reached out and cupped Zenyatta’s face, tilting it towards him.

“Let’s experiment,” Genji said.

Zenyatta covered Genji’s hand with his long metal fingers before he got up. This time, it was Zenyatta who led them to the bed, without any of the pushy urgency Genji had showed, but with a calm purpose that made Genji’s cock stir under its hard cover.

“Let me just take this off,” Zenyatta said, after he had turned Genji to sit on the bed, reaching for the heavy belt around his hip and sliding the fabric down over his long legs.

Looking closer, Genji found himself fascinated again by the stark difference between hard, durable metal and the many delicate weak points of his body, but this time, murder was not the first thought on his mind. Rather, he imagined his fingers sliding into the gaps and between the moving parts, the reactions he might elicit. There was a loose loop of cables hanging at Zenyatta’s waist and the hip joins where exposed. The light broke on the metal where it was scratched or scuffed, but those details just made him more interesting to look at.

As Zenyatta turned away to lay aside his thick prayer orbs, Genji stood, following a sudden impulse. If he wanted to look at Zenyatta, who was so different in body than any of the people Genji had slept with and admired before, then he would let Zenyatta look at him. Perhaps he hated this body, but it might hold some beauty to an omnic, or perhaps just to another person, this person.

His uniform was quickly stripped. As Zenyatta turned, one orb still in his hand, he halted when he saw Genji undressed.

“You’ve seen me like this before,” Genji muttered, before Zenyatta even had a chance to say if he approved or not. “I figured it made no difference.”

Without his face mask and his clothes, Genji was the most naked he had been with anyone since – well, since Zenyatta had accidentally knocked the mask off. He’d seen him exactly like this before. There was no reason to be nervous, but Genji shifted like an anxious teenager, anyway.

“I am glad,” Zenyatta said, stepping close. “I did not mind that you kept your clothes on, but when you removed them in the gym, I wished I had seen more of you before.”

Genji snorted, but dragged him in, anyway. “You have a sweet tongue for a monk.”

“I don’t have a tongue at all. Unfortunately, as I understand it would be useful here.” The joke came so flatly that Genji could not help but grin. Zenyatta lifted his right hand. He was still holding one orb and it glowed golden again. “However, I wondered if perhaps you would mind if I left this on you while we are busy.”

“I don’t need healing,” Genji said, bemused.

“I know, but I have been told it’s a pleasant feeling.”

To that Genji could attest. He reached out and closed his hand around the ball, his fingers intertwined with Zenyatta’s. Immediately, the warmth moved up his arm again.

“Should I hold it the whole time?”

“No, that won’t be necessary.”

With a gentle tug, Zenyatta pulled the orb back to himself and then threw it in the air. It hovered above Genji’s head, its golden glow connecting to him in one river of light, flowing from the ball to him and there down all the threads of his synthetic nerves.

“Nice trick.”

Genji hugged Zenyatta more tightly and kissed him as he sank down onto the bed. Zenyatta didn’t have a mouth, but the seam between the upper and lower parts of his faceplate was situated just so that it looked like one. Genji’s own mouth, the new one, half silicon, had not kissed anyone yet, but it fit nicely against the metal of Zenyatta’s face and the pistons of his neck. He did not hold back now, already laid bare, and instead pushed his tongue into small, smooth gaps, turning Zenyatta so that he could nip at the cables that laid along his spin and ran up to the base of his metal head before lowering his mouth to his waist.

Zenyatta grasped at him, caressed him. Genji’s body was an advanced construct, covered in sensors that felt acutely the trail of warm steel over his back and arms. He had missed this, he realised. He’d missed being properly touched. He didn’t think he would have felt comfortable in just anyone’s arms, though.

“What are you going to do?” Zenyatta asked with a curiosity that was tinged by lust. Something in his chest had started humming quietly, probably an extra fan to stave off the growing heat.

“You may not have a tongue, but I do.”

Genji dropped his head further down and lifted one of Zenyatta’s legs over his shoulder. His cock was already standing and Genji enveloped it in his mouth with one smooth downward thrust of his head. He’d missed this, too, if he was honest, especially the part where the person under him twitched and made noise for him. Zenyatta’s quiet hums were no less beautiful than a human’s hitching breath. He’d missed enjoying someone instead of fucking them until his body was forced to gather what human resources it had and gave him a minute or two of thoughtless bliss.

Zenyatta’s hand rested lightly on his head and the orb still spread a golden glow over both of them, feeling like another gentle touch that moved over every part of Genji’s body. He sucked Zenyatta’s cock deeper into his mouth, pleased with the way Zenyatta’s leg coiled at the knee and quickly unfurled again, the way he squirmed when Genji pressed his tongue tightly against him, and how his fingers pressed against the hard alloy of Genji’s shoulders. With one hand, Genji reached between his legs to retract the modesty panel and then brushed his fingers over Zenyatta’s thigh before prodding at his entrance again. One finger went in quite easily even without lubrication and Genji felt a soft texture inside, a little smoother than a human body, but just as warm from Zenyatta’s working machinery.

He raised his head slowly, still sucking him on his way up, and Zenyatta’s hand shuddered as if he was tempted to try to keep him down for a moment. Genji smirked as he sat up.

“I want to fuck you,” he told him honestly.

Zenyatta seemed to need a moment to steady himself, running his fingers over Genji’s jaw.

“I am not opposed, but sadly I’m not a very advanced model in that capacity. Accommodating you should be no problem, as I have full control over these parts, but I have no way to lubricate.”

“I think I can help with that.”

Genji moved to the edge of the bed and thrust a hand into his bag. He never unpacked his luggage no matter where he travelled or even if he was at home, so everything was still in its place and he didn’t need to dig long for the lube. When he looked back, he saw Zenyatta had sat up, all awake interest.

“Don’t worry, I am coming back,” Genji said, spreading lube on his fingers.

“You do have a way to rob me of all my patience. That teaches me to be too proud of myself,” Zenyatta said, laughing as he pulled Genji in and put his arms around his ribcage, holding him tightly as if he could not get enough of the feeling of Genji’s body on his own. Since they were sitting together on the bed now, Genji reached around him and pressed his finger inside again before slicking himself up, shuddering even at the touch of his own hand, excited as he was.

Zenyatta did not wait for him to move and instead pushed himself up straighter on his knees. With Genji almost sitting on his haunches and his cock standing proudly, Zenyatta could easily climb on top of him and then sink down.

Genji held his breath, but the pressure in his body was too great to be contained. To his own surprise, Genji felt the exhausts on his shoulder engaging.

Zenyatta stopped, but when he saw the look of surprise on Genji’s face, he chuckled.

“Are you alright?”

“Yes,” Genji murmured. “Apparently, you’re making me overheat.”

“I would stop, but you do not look like you want me to.”

“Don’t you dare,” Genji muttered, grabbing Zenyatta by the hips and tilting them, putting him on his back. Zenyatta’s voice garbled in a clearly pleasurable exclamation as Genji’s cock shifted inside him, and Genji’s own breath stuttered.

Zenyatta was angling his hips up, so Genji started fast and firm, fingers digging into the joints at his knees as he held his legs up. Above him was still the golden light, shifting ever so slightly to follow the movements of his body, like gentle hands running over his limbs. It almost made him feel light-headed, draining all the miniscule exhaustion his movements would usually have caused, leaving only pure pleasure.

Zenyatta had wrapped his hands around Genji’s arms, body moving with the fast rhythm Genji set for them. There was a little uncertainty, the mark of someone not quite used to matching his movements to another, but his eagerness more than made up for it. Genji sat up straight to put one hand on Zenyatta’s hips to guide him and Zenyatta followed that touch, made Genji’s mind race wondering what other instructions Zenyatta might like to follow, or what ideas of his own Zenyatta’s clever, playful mind would come up with once he had found his footing.

Reality quickly drew his attention from those fantasies, though, enticing as they were, with the image of long metal limbs spread out before him, Zenyatta pressing his head into the blanket, and then with sudden force there came a wave of heat from the orb that shuddered down Genji’s spine, made him stumble over his own peak with the strongest orgasm he’d had in years, just as the walls of Zenyatta’s mechanical muscles drew tighter around his cock. Genji spilled himself gasping, hips stuttering, coming apart.

Zenyatta laid comfortably pliant under him, the fan in his chest still humming. Genji leaned over him, head bowed. As the pleasure subsided, something content remained, the warmth of Zenyatta around him and the orb above him, and Zenyatta’s broad hand reaching out to lay on the back of his neck.

He wanted to stay here, talk to him about Tokyo, food, practice, people, anything to hear more of him. He wanted to just lay on his chest and listen to the machinery working.

Even through the glow of the orb, cold fear ran through Genji’s veins. Why would he make himself want things he could not have? He should not have agreed to this.

Quickly, Genji pulled out of Zenyatta, who sat up after a moment.

“This is good,” Genji said awkwardly, plucking the orb out of the air to hand it to Zenyatta. “If you ever – you should keep it on people.”

Despite knowing better, he could not quite bring himself to tell Zenyatta to keep it on somebody else while he slept with them. He didn’t really want him to do that.

“I’m happy you enjoyed it,” Zenyatta said, raising his hand to receive the ball in the air, then let the others join to float in a slow circle around his neck.

Genji nodded his head and got up. He needed to put his faceplate back on. By the time he had also found the pieces of his uniform, Zenyatta had slipped on his trousers.

“Are you alright?” Zenyatta asked, as he fastened his belt, without preamble, without firmness in his voice, a friendly reassurance.

“Of course,” Genji said curtly.

Zenyatta was too smart to not have noticed the pattern by now, how he fled from him after getting just a little too close. He wondered just how foolish Zenyatta thought him.

Zenyatta regarded him, but did not seem to know what to say and eventually just lowered his head.

“I hope I will see you again soon. Perhaps, before I leave with the others, we could practice in the gym once more?”

It sounded safe. It wasn’t, but it was just innocuous enough that the worse part of Genji made him nod his head.

“Tomorrow evening, after I fetch you from the shrine?”

Zenyatta chuckled quietly as he turned to the door. “I see you aren’t really trying to change my mind anymore.”

Genji halted, and, against his will, smiled behind the mask.

“I had to face reality – you’re too hard-headed.”

The door opened and automatically, as if drawn by some magnetism, Genji followed Zenyatta one step into the hallways. Zenyatta raised his hand, fingers only brushing Genji’s elbow.

“I suppose I do know what I want.”

The sentence petered out as Zenyatta turned his head to check on the noise of footsteps approaching. Genji’s gaze snapped up in the same moment. Mondatta stood a few feet away at the end of the hallway.

“Brother,” Zenyatta said pleasantly. “Are you going to join the others? I will follow you.”

“Yes,” Mondatta said gravely, his gaze going between the two of them.

Zenyatta’s faceplate imitated a yielding, benevolent expression; Mondatta’s, by virtue of its cast, always looked more severe. Still, Genji could not but feel that the look he sent him did not feel so firm only because of the face he had been settled with by his maker. 

“Good night,” Zenyatta told him gently.

While Genji still stood in frozen silence, Zenyatta turned and joined Mondatta.

What would Mondatta think of him? Zenyatta likely had at least a little fondness for him, but to Mondatta, he was at best a playboy using his job to find partners, and at worst he was smart enough to have realised that Genji was not one of the Overwatch members who had ever been on any recruitment posters, and he might have wondered why that was.

 _I’m hearing about this back at Overwatch_ , Genji thought, as he let the door close behind him, and it almost summoned a bitter smile to his lips. Expecting to be berated for whom he took to bed – it’d almost be nostalgic. They could hardly do worse to him than Hanzo had, though, and as he looked inside himself to guess what his reaction would be if Overwatch put him on the bench for a while, he found he did not care anymore and probably hadn’t in a while.

-

When Genji had first insisted on accompanying Zenyatta, it was mostly because he was worried about the streets he would take back to the hotel. He had not expected to find him facing down a group of humans who stood too close, holding him five against one, right next to the wayside shrine, where little old ladies watered the plants and kids forgot their toys before going home in the evening.

He’d gone about this all wrong, Genji realised in an instance, the world slowing around him in the way it always did right before a fight. He’d figured if Zenyatta got in trouble it would be with criminals of Genji’s own calibre because that was the sort of thing he’d grown up with, was how he knew the city. Most people who didn’t want omnics around weren’t that organised, though, some definitely not that clever. They didn’t care whether they would be seen.

“Zenyatta,” Genji said to get their attention, swallowing the fear and worry that sat in his chest, made him want to jump right in, be reckless.

Zenyatta turned his head. The group looked up as well. Three men, two women, early twenties. Fit, but they wore stiff leather jackets, tight jeans, loafers and slippers without ankle support. Not ready for a real fight. Still, one switchblade could cause tragedy even in the hand of an amateur – sometimes especially in theirs.

“Another tin can?” one of the women said.

“Step away if you know what is good for you,” Genji answered.

One man built himself up, throwing his shoulders back as he faced Genji.

“Or what?” he said. “You brought a sword? That’s cute. What are you, a cosplayer? Sorry to say we have real heat.”

As he spoke, he lifted his jacket to reveal the gun at his belt.

“Please,” Zenyatta said gently, “I don’t want to fight.”

Genji wanted to snap at him that there was no other way, but, for once, he hesitated. Was it the words Zenyatta had said now or perhaps more those he’d spoken before – that he thought Genji was good for more? If he were right, how would he solve this problem? In thirty seconds or so, a fight would definitely be inevitable, but there was a window here that Genji had seen other people who fought alongside him use before. Mercy, Reinhardt, Jack – even Hanzo, back in the day, all in their own ways, had known how to diffuse and not just how to light the fire.

Words wouldn’t do the trick here. Zenyatta had mastery of that and evidently, he hadn’t managed to keep the group in check. What else was there? Threats, but not the normal kind, not the sort they could start arguing with.

“Let me show you something,” Genji said.

He gripped the handle of his sword, but pulled it only slowly, so that the group could see he was not trying to attack. However, all the anger he did not unload on them, the fury and concern, was turned inward and woke the dragon that lived still in the remainders of his flesh. In a coil of green light, he sprang forth and wound around Genji’s body and the blade of his sword, opening his wide maw, growing and growing until he towered over them all, a pulsing figure of light.

There were exclamations, screams. The man in the front clutched his weapon, but didn’t seem to know where to point it. As they stared, Genji saw suddenly that Zenyatta had moved just a little. One of his orbs floated above the group, shifting its attachment from one to the other. It emanated a cool, purple glow that was too dark to come from any source of light, and where it attached, faces grew whiter, eyes even wider.

When the first man turned and ran, the others followed like a stampede. Soon, their footsteps were lost in the noise of the city.

“Magnificent,” Zenyatta said, staring at the dragon even as Genji forced it back, let it fall to sleep inside him. “What is that?”

“A family heirloom of sorts. He’s in my blood.”

Genji took a deep breath and sheathed his sword. He wanted to hit something, but at the same time, he was shocked by the fact that he hadn’t needed to.

“Thank you for your help.”

“Are you alright?”

“Yes, they were only hassling me,” Zenyatta said, allowing Genji to look at him from all sides. “Though had you not come by, I fear that wouldn’t have been all.”

“What was that thing you pointed at them?”

The dragon always made him wilder, more short-sighted, and with his blood still running hot with the dragon’s energy, he grabbed the purple ball that still floated by Zenyatta’s head without thinking, like he had always taken the golden orb in his hand.

His metal ribcage seized around his weak human heart and adrenaline rushed through him like rain poured down in a storm. There seemed to be snipers on the rooftops, perhaps perched behind the dark windows around them, too, monsters behind the corners. Distantly, there was Zenyatta calling his name, but it was drowned out as he heard Hanzo’s voice in the back of his head. _Weak. No wonder you were such easy prey._

Genji let the orb go as if he’d been bitten. Zenyatta was holding his shoulders and reflexively, Genji clung to his arm. Zenyatta hugged him tightly.

“I apologise! I wanted to warn you. That orb is the balance to the one I gave you – it’s discord. I do not mean for my friends to touch it, except when they ask me to make them face their fears.”

Taking a shuddering breath dampened behind his mask, Genji forced his thoughts back in order. Perhaps he held back his words for a moment longer than he needed to as well. The sudden pain the orb had caused sat deep like a splinter, but it had been so long since someone has hugged him, not in bed, but to calm him, to be kind.

“I probably should not have taken it without asking you first,” he murmured eventually.

Zenyatta gave a small huff of laughter that sounded relieved. “You could not have known.”

“Come,” Genji said, reluctantly giving up the embrace. “They may still return and bring friends.”

They made their way back home quickly and without many words this time, intent on escaping, as fast as Zenyatta could walk, Genji matching his step. In front of the hotel, however, Zenyatta stopped him with a hand on his arm.

“Thank you again. Without you, I’d have been forced to fight. If it had been necessary, I would have, but I may not have won, and either way I’m grateful it did not come to that. That was your doing.”

“It was not how I usually operate,” Genji said slowly. “I did it for you. I told you, fighting is what I do.”

“Yet I did not ask you. It came from you, after all.” Zenyatta lowered his head. “I admit, it pains me to part now. You are a intriguing man and I would like to know so much more about you.”

With too many words stuck in his throat at Zenyatta’s open admission, Genji finally gave up on speaking. He just grabbed Zenyatta’s head and knocked their foreheads together. As he let him go, Zenyatta’s hands were fidgeting with his belt, the mala around his neck floating at a nervous, uneven speed.

“I know we planned to go to the gym, but I should tell Mondatta about what happened. I probably won’t have time to meet you in the morning, but I will write to you.”

“Yes, I’d like that.”

Zenyatta hesitated for a moment longer before he bowed his head and walked towards the entrance of the hotel. Genji remained standing outside for a while longer.

-

Genji did not sleep much that night, instead turning every moment of the evening in his head again and again, his blade laying across his knees. If there was one thing he had realised with sudden clarity, it was that he was tired of drawing this sword to fight, not because he did not ever enjoy it, but because for so long, his sword had been the only solution to every problem, the only thing he was good at handling, the only thing that defined him.

Realistically, the fact that he’d hesitated and sidestepped once did not mean anything. However, he was sure Zenyatta would have disagreed, and more importantly, he would have meant it. What would it be like to see the world how Zenyatta saw it?

It was a pull that had twin powers, its force coming at once from the careful curiosity about the wisdom Zenyatta had presented, and through his affection for Zenyatta himself.

Still, Zenyatta should have someone who matched his quiet temper, his good spirit. Fixing Genji was a task no person should be burdened with – and yet, it had never seemed like Zenyatta was at all burdened by his presence.

Hope was such a foolish, unkillable little creature.

Those feelings still warred inside him as he followed the omnic monks to the airport in the morning, watched them move through security so they could get back to Kalkutta, from where they would travel to their main temple. Overwatch left them to themselves from here and Genji’s job was done. He’d barely seen Zenyatta except as one of the silver, white-clad figures walking somewhere in the crowd.

He was packing up his things in the hotel when his phone blinked. Zenyatta’s number appeared at the top of the screen.

_I had hoped to say goodbye to you again. We already did, but I think I wanted to draw it out a little more. I hope you, too, have a pleasant journey home._

Genji stared at the message for a long moment. He had written. You never really expected people to. Genji didn’t.

Home. What did that mean? He was technically home, but he felt no connection to it. And what waited for him at Overwatch? Some people there appreciated him, no doubt, but he had never made himself much space in their life, solitary and angry as he had been. Why would he continue to go down this empty path? Was it not insanity to blindly charge forward when he didn’t even have a goal?

Genji closed the message. Writing the resignation e-mail for Overwatch took no time at all. He had done that in his head for months.

Maybe Genji was not yet the man Zenyatta deserved, but it seemed for some reason only the fates knew, Zenyatta liked him, anyway. If nothing else, at least he would help Genji and Genji wanted to take his hand, that promise that someone did not mind dealing with him, that glimpse of something new Zenyatta had shown him.

The speeder flight Genji booked was set to arrive at about the same time as the commercial plain the Shambali travelled on. Genji’s head felt empty as he sat in the seat, staring out at the clouds. He could not allow himself to think yet. Whatever would happen, the absolute lack of sadness he felt leaving Overwatch behind told him he had not made the wrong decision there, but he could not pretend like Zenyatta’s approval was incidental now that this weight was off his shoulders.

Once he had landed, Genji switched on the tracker for Zenyatta’s phone again. There was an unread message from Overwatch, but it seemed they hadn’t disabled his equipment yet. He did not click the message and instead followed the dot.

It seemed the omnics intended to travel the rest of the way by Vishkar bullet train, as they had moved on to a nearby station. Genji strapped his bag more tightly around himself and started running.

By the time he’d found the platform, Genji was out of breath, his face hot under his armour and all his vents working in the sweltering heat of a red noon. However, the omnics still stood around the platform when he arrived, quietly chatting with each other.

Zenyatta was among them, talking to a few of his brothers and sisters, Mondatta by his side. Genji swallowed. This was not the moment at which he would be stopped, though, even if it meant facing down the leader of the Shambali.

“Zenyatta.”

Zenyatta raised his head in a sudden movement.

“Genji?”

Everyone was staring at him. More eyes on him. Genji didn’t care as long as Zenyatta was also looking.

“Can I talk to you for a minute?”

“Of course.”

Zenyatta nodded at the others and kept his gaze a little longer on Mondatta, who held it, but did not protest. With a gesture, Zenyatta led Genji down the platform. They would not be in private, but at least they were out of earshot.

“What are you doing here? Don’t you have to go back to Overwatch? Did they send you?”

“No, no. I – think it’s for the better if I don’t return for now.”

“How come?”

Genji took a deep breath.

“I cannot only be a weapon anymore. I don’t know if there _is_ anything else I can be at this point, but I don’t know how to keep doing that, either.”

He sounded pathetic and broken to himself, but Zenyatta just nodded his head.

“I know you take ub pilgrims in at the temple,” Genji pressed on, “and – I want to try. I can’t promise I’ll be a good acolyte. Mondatta talks sense, but I don’t know if I could ever be like you...”

“That is fine. You don’t need to be certain. Pilgrims are wanderers, are they not? Besides, you shouldn’t strive to be me, you should strive to be you.”

Genji raised his head, encouraged by the obvious, bright pleasure in Zenyatta’s voice.

“I see what you are saying, but I like you more than me,” he said quietly. “I would lie if I said that sharing your world view is the only reason I came. I want to keep being around you.”

He reached out and touched Zenyatta’s shoulder. Zenyatta covered Genji’s hand with his own.

“I would like that very much.”

Genji smiled under the mask. He wanted to close Zenyatta in his arms, but he was acutely aware of all the Shambali still watching them carefully. Maybe they would worry if a man carrying a sword would get so close to one of their own so suddenly and he didn’t want an altercation.

“I suppose that means you will travel with us, then! There is still enough time to get a ticket for you, but we should tell my brothers and sisters first.”

“I’m sure Mondatta will be thrilled that a wayward Overwatch drop-out is hanging off his oldest friend’s arm.”

Zenyatta chuckled. “He’s more wary than me, but he has an open mind. You will see when you live with us.”

They walked back to the group together and though most of the omnics had unmoving faces, Genji could all but feel their confusion.

“Genji Shimada wishes to join us as a pilgrim, Mondatta,” Zenyatta says.

“Is he not with Overwatch? Will you be called back soon?” Mondatta asked.

“No, not as of this morning,” Genji said, bowing his head.

“I see,” Mondatta turned away from him. “He has your trust, Zenyatta?”

“Yes, he does,” Zenyatta said.

“I’m not surprised,” Mondatta answered with the slightest hint of benevolent irony, though it seemed only aimed at Zenyatta. His voice was stern and true again as he told Genji: “Then I welcome you, Genji Shimada.”

Again, Genji bowed, and the other sisters and brothers murmured their welcomes as well. Zenyatta stood so close their shoulders touched, and though the enormity of all the decisions he had made in one morning threatened to collapse on him in that moment, Genji was glad.


End file.
